Traveling the World One Day at a Time

March 07, 2011

Why I Hate the iPad!

I don't doubt this is a revolutionary device. I like using it for many things, but when I watch Lila play games -- I shake my head and hate it!

There's just something about playing a game on this crazy thing that makes my normally pleasant child aggressive. Lila doesn't listen when she's playing. She ignores, probably doesn't even hear, what we say to her. If you try to take it from her, she becomes petulant and angry.

I've seen it happen to Noah, too, especially when he and Lila play Plants vs Zombies together. Lila grabs his hand in this pincer like grasp she has. It's not particularly painful, but she is surprisingly strong and quick. It's definitely aggravating. So Noah is aggravated. Then Lila gets upset. Then there might even be some grabbing and pushing.

Or they both poke at the screen trying to play together and end up poking each other. Worse, they block each other and miss a point or a sun or whatever it is. Then they both get frustrated. Then I get frustrated.

Is it really so wrong for me to take it away from them? Tell them that if they can't play nicely with the iPad, they're going to lose it until tomorrow?

But I don't blame them.

I've felt the same intensity with Angry Birds. When someone distracts me, and I accidentally set off a bird before I'm ready. Then it flies off in some random direction, and I don't crush a single pig. I get mad. It makes me want to pincer grip people and maybe even push them away.

Clearly I'm not the first to see this. A recent article on NPR calls angry birds addictive. So I researched it and found this study that suggests certain tones raise our serotonin levels. Could the bips and beeps and squawks from iPad games invoke that little rush of pleasure in addition to the reward of seeing the pigs' clever and maze-like defenses dropped?

When we're then removed from our tonal reward, do we then become aggressive?

What I do know is that anyone in our house -- metaphorically speaking, since we don't actually have a house -- must stop playing when they become rude during a game. If you don't stop on your own, it will be taken from you.

Yes, I mean it. Please don't test me.

What else I don't like?

It's all been said before, so I'll keep it short. The keyboard. I find it cumbersome to use. So I don't. Ever. At all. I figure, though, this is simply a technology limit that will change soon enough. It's annoying, also, that iPad doesn't support Flash.

What I do like?

I use it primarily for reading. Suddenly I can read magazines and books. That's a lovely new thing in the five years since we left NY. The games themselves force you to think logically and spatially. Apps tend to be either free or you can buy them for less than $2 each. We've recently started using one to help Lila keep track of her chores.

I'm a huge fan of Flipboard. During my recent visit to NY, I chatted with Benjamin Wagner, old friend and SVP of MTVi, who loves the interactivity of Flipboard. Where else can you so seamlessly integrate social media platforms, Google Reader and RSS feeds while also staying in touch with what your friends are reading and doing?

Just In Time for iPad 2

I've managed to squeak my little review in just before the iPad 2 comes out March 11, 2011. The new one has a camera and video camera. Lighter. Thinner. Has a cover attached magnetically to protect the display so you don't need a separate case. The screen, apparently is sensitive to strength of touch.

Comments

I like iPad so much. I am still waiting of iPad 2. he new iPad is dual core, front and rear facing cameras, an all new A5 dual core CPU and a nine times more powerful GPU. The new Apple iPad2 is more thinner, faster and lighter.

On Angry Birds.
Hanako and I just got back from Bermuda for a couple of days for my 40th bday. There was a kid we saw there with his mom and dad the first night at a restaurant. He was playing Angry Birds on the iPad and his mom was feeding him. When she asked him to concentrate on his food he became petulant. But when he couldn't get past a board, he gave it to his dad to help out. Hanako called him whiny boy, I called him Angry Bird boy. There weren't too many tourists around Bermuda since it was off season and we saw them at least two or three other times around the island.

On the one hand, it did seem like a bonding moment between the kid and his dad. Perhaps there's something similar between Lila and Noah, even though it looks like they're competing a bit or getting frustrated a bit.

But on Angry Birds itself: I play it on my Android phone and there's something I found that bears emphasis: there's no consequence for failure. You just keep going at a given level until you get it right. Sometimes, when I see that I've just shot the first bird wrong, I just start the level over right away. Perhaps there's some way to impress this upon Lila: no matter what happens to distract her or delay her from the game, it's still right there where she left off. I suppose sometimes when you've almost completed a level and you screw up there's some cost to having to start the level over, but you now know how to get to that point again and it will happen pretty quickly.